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5.1. Moral Insolvency PDF Print E-mail
Written by Hugh Morrow   
Friday, 07 December 2007
A number of executives from the sector observed that many organisations struggle financially, to the point that they don’t know where the “next dollar is coming from”.  This is an alarming observation for two reasons.

The first concern arises from the possibility of financial insolvency.  One of the most important functions of a board of directors is to represent and protect the interests of stakeholders.   If a company is not able to “meets its debts as they fall due” it is insolvent and the directors are liable for any additional debts incurred.  It is not clear from the comments that executives and board members pay sufficient attention to the risks of insolvency, particularly as organisations rapidly scale and enter new areas of operation.

In some respects though, there is an even worse concern.  That is the possibility of “moral insolvency” … the inability to “maintain interventions through to their completion”.  Many Social Economy organisations attempt to change society, or its members, for the better through long term interventions (such as educating the mentally ill to become more independent).  Not following through on an intervention once started might cause substantial harm to the “clients” of the intervention.  

Do short term funding cycles fly directly in the face of the long term intervention and require organisations to step up and find ways to ensure long term financial support to match their interventions?

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